Hi all!

First, let me apologize for my lack of updates. I’ve been incredibly busy adding new features to CogBox.

But let’s move on to the fun news!

Together with my friend and colleague Rory Cornelius, I’m going to be presenting at TXC in September of this year! ChatGPT I wrote the following description:

Report bursting is a powerful capability that allows you to create a single template report and effortlessly generate customized outputs for each recipient. Whether you’re dealing with a handful of recipients or a large-scale distribution, Cognos will handle the workload efficiently, freeing up your time for more strategic tasks.

During our session, we’ll guide you through the process of setting up and optimizing report bursting in Cognos. One exciting topic on the agenda is using Event Studio to create dynamic subject lines for burst emails. Imagine personalizing subject lines based on specific recipient attributes, or attaching the results of multiple burst reports into a single email.

Another area we’ll explore is the smart utilization of bursting on directory entries. By leveraging this feature, you can ensure that users see their own data instantly – no matter how complex the source report. We’ll discuss real-world use cases that highlight the practical benefits of this approach and how it can enhance your organization’s reporting workflows.

Our aim is to provide you with a comprehensive understanding of report bursting, from personalizing the individual burst outputs to common (and no so common) problems you may encounter. We will also go over integrating the burst outputs with other Cognos functionalities, covering all of the essential aspects that ensure you make the most of this feature.

So, if you’re ready to take your reporting game to the next level and explore the untapped potential of Cognos report bursting, make sure to reserve your spot for “Maximizing Cognos Reports with Report Bursting.”

One of the things I’ll talk about is a system I made for a road safety organization in which every fatal accident had a complicated generated report. Every morning the report would burst to the file system all of the accidents from the previous year. The run time of these 20+ page reports dropped down to instant.

Another system I wrote for another company was a complicated series of personalized reports for salespeople. Every night after the ETL ran I had a dozen or so reports bursting based on the CAMID. Users would log in and see their data instantly. The database people were also happy because the majority of the load happened at night .

I ended up submitting a total of 7 session proposals, and I’m a little disappointed that my session on secret APIs in Cognos wasn’t accepted. I guess talking about unsupported code that I only found by decompiling internal Java classes is undesirable for the IBM management team. The proposal “Harnessing the Stars: Using Cognos for Astrological Forecasting – a warning on AI text generators” also wasn’t accepted, which really wasn’t a surprise to me, but I was planning on writing a full fledged AI generated horoscope system and then ranting about how stupid and unreliable generative AI is at the moment.

Also, if you’re reading this on July 21st, 2023, you have until the end of today to register to get the Early Bird discount! Like voting, you should use this link to register early and often!

If you’re attending, drop me a message and we can meet up! I’m planning on flying in the weekend before the conference starts.